


A belt, a comb, an apple... wait, that's a tomato

by Minou8822



Category: Naruto
Genre: Alternate Universe, Childhood Friends, Cute Kids, Fairy Tale Elements, First Kiss, Friendship, M/M, Other, Sasunaru only if you really look for it, School
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-22
Updated: 2020-03-22
Packaged: 2021-02-28 23:08:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,833
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23265217
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Minou8822/pseuds/Minou8822
Summary: At the age of eight Naruto was fairly sure he’d stumbled upon the coming true of a fairy tale.He wasn’t a straight A student. Heck, even a C was a rare and happy occasion. But this time he read the signs of what nobody else saw coming. The insidious murder of a beautiful princess. Or prince. He wasn’t too particular on the gender when everything else fit the bill.
Relationships: Uchiha Sasuke & Uzumaki Naruto
Comments: 4
Kudos: 9





	A belt, a comb, an apple... wait, that's a tomato

**Author's Note:**

  * For [KizuKatana](https://archiveofourown.org/users/KizuKatana/gifts).



> I'm gifting this fic to KizuKatana, who inspires me to write what's in my head. My very first story.
> 
> This is to creativity, unprejudiced people, and one of the loveliest people out there who encouraged and betaed this story.

...

At first he thought they did it because his eyes were blue. At the orphanage all the other kids had brown eyes. In variations, but brown nonetheless.

Shortly after he thought it didn’t help that his hair was blond, either. Again, not brown or, most commonly, black, but a bright yellow that would vie with sunflowers.

After that it occurred to him that he was louder than most kids, too. He couldn’t sit still like them. Wouldn’t be full after a small portion for dinner like everyone else. He couldn’t fall asleep at naptime, didn’t like his carrots (They were orange! They should, by all means, be the bestest vegetable Mother Nature had to give. But boy did they do something to the usually tasty, undeserving sticks of happy colour…), had difficulties learning his Hiragana, and so on and so forth.

At some point he stopped counting. Stopped being attentive to every difference. Everything that made him alien to everybody else at the orphanage. He just was. Different, that is.

And that is why they did it. He was sure of as much. Treated him differently than all the other kids.

Never had a smile for him. A pat on the head. Could be mean or would outright bully him. Weren’t concerned for him over scraped knees, torn clothes or tears in his eyes.

Weren’t interested. 

~(˘▾˘~)

At the age of eight Naruto was fairly sure he’d stumbled upon the coming true of a fairy tale.

He wasn’t a straight A student. Heck, even a C was a rare and happy occasion. But this time he read the signs of what nobody else saw coming. The insidious murder of a beautiful princess. Or prince. He wasn’t too particular on the gender when everything else fit the bill.

Naruto thought it probable that nobody else realized the drama because it was a European story unfolding. Being Japanese, and surrounded by their rich culture, most kids his age and older people he knew only knew about their country’s legends and tales. Naruto knew better.

Once a month the orphanage he lived at would be visited by a teacher from a local school. A different person almost every time. They were given a list of stories the kids had already been read to and asked to bring a new one. Naruto should know them all. He’d been living at the orphanage all his life. However, he was too excitable for most of the others. Kids, caretakers and teachers alike. They didn’t like him sitting in on their story time. He was too loud. Too annoying for them. So he’d been ordered to go play outside most of the time.

One time, around the age of five, he’d been sitting behind the door of an adjacent room though. For once playing quietly with one of the racing car toys he rarely had the chance to play with. The other boys usually kept all the cool toys to themselves.

Their teacher that day had a soft and calming voice. He’d also had a soft look in his eyes that Naruto was able to see before being ushered out of the room by a caretaker. It made him hesitate on the other side of the door and decide to wait a moment longer. When the nice looking teacher started to tell his story for the day and nobody came to chase him away, Naruto decided to sit down where he stood and listen in. He knew all the escape routes, should he be caught.

The teacher’s muffled voice told of a beautiful princess, living in a big big castle with her evil stepmother. Naruto was awed by the description of her luminous white skin, black hair and red lips. He was livid with her stepmother’s evil machinations to try and kill the girl. Distraught when she bit into the apple to never wake up again. Slightly appalled by the idea of a kiss as her only salvation and full of glee by the witch’s demise.

He then didn’t know that his defiance of playing outside that one time would one day, three years later, be a crucial act in saving his precious person to come.

(~˘▾˘)~

Whatever normative requirement, political party or, for all he cared, deity had bargained the ratio of weekdays to weekend days, had done a poor poor job. He wasn’t a genius in calculating ratios, but for sure someone had to have made a mistake with this one. Especially with the Friday portion of the week. Who’d be able to concentrate on history, language practice, calculus or any other of school’s torture devices on a Friday afternoon?

In the last row of the classroom Naruto banged his head onto the table top that, more often, served for naps and doodles rather than studious behaviour. In the small space between his half lidded blues and the dull plastic surface of the table he watched a few strands of hair that were squished between his forehead and the standardized piece of furniture.

No use pretending to listen in anymore. Not that anyone would associate such attentive behaviour with him anyways.

A slight breeze came in through the opened front row window. Naruto closed his left eye to be shielded against some of the fluttering hairs. His right eye remained open and took a lazy stroll around the classroom.

To his right hand side sat Shikamaru. Or rather, slept in a slump. Naruto was torn between rolling his one available eye and snickering at the lazy genius. It wasn’t fair how some people didn’t even have to listen to get a grasp of not only what their teachers said, but all the advanced stuff as well. Naruto didn’t have any reason to complain though. Not only was Shikamaru his friend (somewhat), but also prevented him from flunking several classes. Albeit with no small amount of grumbling or complaining or both at the same time, he did seem to care.

Naruto decided to grace him with a softened grin. Shika wouldn’t see it, but eeh.. He knew, without big gestures, how grateful Naruto was.

Right behind Shikamaru sat Chouji. The heavy-set boy had been asked to refrain from eating in class, but that didn’t keep him from steeling glances at the backpack sitting to his feet. Two big and now empty lunchboxes would be inside. Chouji hated sharing his food. He did make exceptions, though. His best friend, Shikamaru, being one. And since the day the two of them had been in search of a quiet place to rest and eat during lunch break and stumbled upon a stomach-ache induced dry heaving Naruto, he’d become an exception too.

It had been a particularly bad day for Naruto. For the last two days he’d been pushed to the end of the line during breakfast and dinner time at the orphanage. It’d been the perfect excuse for the food lady to snarl at him and lie about not much food being left. Hence his tiny portions. He didn’t want to think about how some of the older kids had scarfed down their normal sized portions and gone for seconds.

He had decided, long ago, that thinking about it too much put him in a dangerous place. So he didn’t.

Blinking now, as another gust of wind brought his thoughts back to the classroom, he focused on some movement further down Shikamaru’s row. Sakura, a really pretty girl, was waving her hand in the air for their teacher to notice.

Pretty in more ways than one. Pretty cute? Yes! Pretty smart? Certainly. But also pretty obstinate, pretty strong and especially pretty liberal on using her fists whenever her words were being ignored. Naruto’d been introduced to that method of hers more often than he liked.

When they met for the first time, he thought her to be as shy and cute as she looked. A possibly cute future girlfriend. After being turned down one or two times (yeah ok, it might have been five times, but who’s counting), and not always in the nicest of ways, he stopped.

Past experiences taught him that you couldn’t will others to like you.

Since then, they were better. Not really friends. But not just classmates either.

He observed, how she lowered her hand after about a minute, knowing that their teacher knew she knew the answer. She wasn’t shy demonstrating her knowledge, but Mrs. Yūhi was one of those still-fresh-to-the-job-teachers that liked to have everyone participate. Going by the motivated look in her ruby eyes, she’d need another year or two to accept that her students’ heads were far off into the weekend. Especially on those unfair-because-it’s-a-weekday Fridays.

Naruto himself had lost the appeal of participation and paying attention around one and a half years ago. Seeing as he was only eight years old, that was fairly early into attending school.

Mrs. Yūhi must have asked another question (or maybe the same question in hopes of gaining someone else’s interest) and it brought Naruto’s sole eye back into focus as Sakura’s hand shot up again. With a sigh that could be heard even in the last row of their classroom, the teacher indicated for Sakura to answer.

Naruto listened to her voice without processing a single word that came out of her mouth. His brain seemed to have shut down completely to anything but white noise, optical stimuli and his own inner musings. It wouldn’t be the first time. He wasn’t worried.

A short bout of silence made him focus yet again. Sakura must have finished and been satisfied with her answer, because she now took her eyes off the teacher, scribbled something onto the notepad in front of her and then angled her body slightly away from the front. She reset her focus on something else entirely. On _someone_ else entirely.

Her own object of fascination. Almost everyone’s object of fascination. Sasuke.

Most Japanese people had fair skin and dark hair. But Sasuke Uchiha was the epitome of them all. He set Naruto back to the day he sat behind a half opened door, listening to a teacher with gentle eyes. He let Naruto relive his fascination of a character with skin white as snow and hair black as ebony. Of course he had to top it all off with fairly red lips that, even though not red as blood (‘cause ew, that would be creepy as hell), made the picture perfect. Simply put, Sasuke Uchiha was the most beautiful person slash fairy tale princess under the sun. Prince. Whatever.

Of course, those attributes alone didn’t make him THE real life Snow White. There were other facts, too.

Naruto had heard some girls in his class talk about how Sasuke lived in a big house. A really big house. Ino, from two seats down his row, said it might as well be a castle.

Another strong argument was that Naruto himself had observed animals approach Sasuke. Sitting under a tree behind the school last summer, Sasuke had had his lunch box on the ground next to him. A squirrel had made its way over to be fed some edamame from the quietly mumbling boy. Naruto hadn’t heard what Sasuke was saying, but proof to him first that they didn’t hold a conversation.

If something really nailed it for Naruto, to be absolutely certain that Sasuke was 21st Century’s Snow White, it was his daily pick up service, though. When school was over, Sasuke would head over to his locker, get all his books, swap slippers for outdoor shoes and be met by the same big black shiny car every day. Only princesses had pick up services, that’s for sure. Or princes. Whatever.

But it wasn’t the car that made Naruto so certain in his belief. It was Sasuke’s _chauffeur_. The (supposedly) driver was a very pretty and probably very old man, if you went by his gravity defying grey hair. Wanting to hide the signs of age, he wore a mask covering the lower half of his face. Only his eye was visible. Not eyes, but eye. The other one was hidden behind an eye patch. Bad eye-sight due to old age, obviously. Nevertheless, the man held himself upright and fit and was still undeniably pretty. But not as pretty as Sasuke. And wasn’t _that_ the thorn in Snow White’s old and greying stepmother’s side?

Veiled and hiding behind a friendly façade lurked that witch, holding a crushing belt, a poisoned comb and, of course, the deadly red apple.

That damn car. And that damn evil witch.

And that’s how Naruto’s dilemma began.

~(˘▾˘~)

The sweetest of all annoying sounds rang throughout the school premise some classes later to officially announce the weekend. With the school bell’s first ring Naruto and everybody else in class rose to pointedly ignore whatever else might come from the room’s front part section.

Stuffing the new assignment sheet next to textbooks, a few loose writing utensils and the water bottle he could only fill halfway due to a crack that would leak additional liquid, Naruto looked up from his backpack as some of his classmates rushed past him and out the door. Eager to get home. It was the weekend, after all.

He had no such urge to hurry anywhere specifically. Sure, he liked the end of a school day like every other student and he loved the end of a Friday even more, but not to rush home.

Home. Hm..

He rather spent his time outside. The school yard was a cool place to be, when almost everyone else was gone. There was a shack behind the old gym building that he had discovered almost a year ago. Their janitor had caught Naruto snooping around, but hadn’t seemed mad. When Naruto had started asking questions about what was in the shack, he’d been allowed to take a look inside. Having other duties to attend to, the janitor had let Naruto roam the small building and upon returning found the kid weeding the adjoining field. Since then, Naruto was the unofficial caretaker of a motley mix of flowers, greens and even some carrots that grew on the field.

For his last birthday the old janitor had given him a pair of gloves to prevent cuts and dry skin. It’d been a really good day.

But before taking care of his shoots today, he’d have to wait for most of the student body to leave for club activities or home. He could then go back inside, change into one of his second (maybe third or fourth) hand, oversized shirts to keep the school uniform clean and start tending to those reliant on him.

To pass the next 15 minutes or so, Naruto sat down on a swing that stood off to the side of their school yard. He was always curious to watch the other kids grouped with their friends and making their way to the nearby train station. Or the ones being picked up by their parents and those lonesome ones with their noses stuck to their phones, leaving the premise.

Or Sasuke. Who had just stepped out of the school building, backpack in hand.

The first time he’d seen Sasuke their first year in school, his mind could only process two things at a time. _How could a scowl that big, fit onto a face that small_ and _what the hell was Snow White doing, going to his school_? It’d come to mind that, of course, they now were in the 21st century and no matter where, even Snow White would have to attend school. The witch would get in trouble if she (he?) kept the princess (prince… whatever… !!) locked away.

And anybody with a stepparent intending to kill them, would be in a foul mood. It was that exact thought, which kept Naruto from punching in Sasuke’s face, whenever the boy’s brain to mouth filter, regarding common courtesy, shut down.

The other boy wasn’t very sociable. Or approachable. Many had tried. Especially girls. Regarding Sasuke’s family situation though, Naruto understood. He himself hadn’t tried talking to the boy, yet. That didn’t keep him from watching though. Sasuke often times caught him in the act, staring at his beautiful face. Why that hadn’t resulted in a beating or scolding yet, Naruto didn’t know. He didn’t even get the stink eye or was being glared at. Sasuke usually would notice him staring and look Naruto square in the eye. It’d make Naruto feel a bit queasy – his cheeks feeling hot – and he’d turn down his eyes to go back to reading or writing or whatever else they were supposed to do.

Pushing off the ground a bit, Naruto swung uncoordinated in his sideway position on the swing. His eyes followed Sasuke’s spiky head of hair until the other boy reached the school gate. As per usual, the black car was parked out front and his the witch stood right next to the back door, holding it open for Sasuke to climb in.

Everything happened the way it always did. Like every Friday the door would be closed gently, the witch would go around the car to get in on the driver’s side and drive off for Naruto to not see the princess for the next two days.

Little did he know that this particular Friday would be the last of its kind. He might have enjoyed the weekend more, if only he knew it’d be the last worry-free one in a little while.

(~˘▾˘)~

Almost exactly one week later, Naruto pushed through all the tall bodies of his school mates and made his way over to, first, the shed and then to the large oak tree he’d observed Sasuke with his squirrel under. It was Shika, Chouji and his designated meeting place for lunch. He’d wanted to reap the two carrots he’d deemed ripe enough to eat yesterday to share them with his friends, before coming back to the tree.

Harvesting them now, to complement Chouji’s yummy lunch box, Naruto felt a bit proud to, at least once, be able to contribute. They had a beautiful deep orange colour. Next year he might try to grow the purple coloured type and see what the differences were.

Rounding the corner of the old gym to get to the tree where Shika and Chouji already sat, Naruto did a double take when between him and his lunch spot stood a group of five boys. Four of them he gauged to be fifth graders, judging by their towering heights and broader shoulders. They all had their eyes turned onto the fifth boy, which Naruto now recognized as Sasuke. Going by the nasty looks on their faces, Naruto guessed they weren’t rounding on him to compliment the younger boy on his good grades, good looks or anything in general. They looked ready to throw punches.

The moment the two guys to Sasuke’s front and back raised their fists to let them rain on the caged up boy, Naruto was on the move. Exactly when Sasuke’s front attacker would have met fist to face, Sasuke dropped into a ninja-like crouch and swept out his leg to kick the guy off his feet. Not expecting the double attack, as everyone was focused on Sasuke, Naruto’s flying kick to the same guy’s butt came as a surprise and catapulted him right into his friend’s fist.

Naruto was glad Sasuke was as quick on his feet as he was in the head and managed to dodge the dropping wimp.

In a fit of anger the two boys to Sasuke’s sides grabbed him, before he could evade their hands. A tearing sound indicated the ripping of fabric as both pulled into opposite directions. They didn’t get any further than that, as the horrifying sound of screeching reached everyone’s ears and stopped them dead in their tracks. A stampede of twelve, maybe fifteen, girls of varying ages came running for the group of boys, furious that anyone would dare hurt _their_ Sasuke. It was scary how nothing the boy did went unobserved.

Quickly Naruto grabbed Sasuke’s hand and pulled him out of his attackers’ hands and the oncoming danger of girls on the hunt. They were a scary bunch. The four big guys must have had similar thoughts as they scrambled to steady themselves and take off at a sprint. The girls gave chase.

Naruto looked after them a bit dumbfounded and then back at Sasuke, whose dark eyes had their intense gaze locked on him. It was a bit unnerving to have them so close to his own face. Where he could make out how very much reflective they were, due to a gleam of excitement that made them shiny.

Wanting to raise his hand to scratch behind his head in a nervous gesture, Naruto realized that he still held on to Sasuke’s own. Who didn’t seem too bothered by it, considering that he gave the grasping appendage a slight squeeze, before letting go. Naruto felt his face go up in flames, but couldn’t help reciprocate the small smirk that grew on Sasuke’s face. The blush of residual shyness still dusting his cheeks did nothing to diminish the huge sunshiny grin adorning Naruto’s face.

Out of the corner of his eyes Naruto saw some movement and looked to where Shikamaru and Chouji were seating themselves back underneath the tree. They seemingly had been on their way over to help fend off those bullies. It made Naruto’s heart grow even warmer.

Looking down at his other hand, he saw that both carrots had remained unscathed by the fight and looked as edible as before. Looking back at Sasuke, he held out his hand, offering one of his bright veggies.

“I grew ‘em myself. Behind the gym, yanno? You can have one. The other one’s for Shika and Chouji though, ‘cause they share their food with me, too.”

Sasuke was apparently surprised by the offer, because it took him a few seconds to take a small step forward and grab the carrot. What surprised them both, though, was that with his movement Sasuke’s pants slid down a few centimetres on one side of his body. A small gasp left his lips as he hurried to pull two torn ends of his waistband together and prevent the piece of clothing from further exposing the boy’s underwear. Wide eyes (wide for Sasuke at least) shot up to look at Naruto.

“Ah, that was the sound I heard. Here, hold the other one for me, will ‘ya.” said the smaller blonde, before pushing the other carrot into Sasuke’s hand and riffling through his own pant pockets.

Before Sasuke could ask what Naruto was looking for, his classmate hurried off towards his friends, throwing a “Wait a sec’!” over his shoulder. Under the tree Naruto pulled a worn looking backpack to his chest and rummaged through its contents. Naruto had dropped his bag underneath the oak tree before making a detour to the shed, knowing Shika and Chouji would guard it. It wouldn’t be the first time for him to be confronted with torn clothes. There should be something in there to help the situation. Ah, yes, there. His fingers closed around a few small shiny objects, before he rushed back to Sasuke.

“Here, you can have ‘em all. Better go and repair that, before our next class, huh?!”

Sasuke looked at his upturned palm – the other hand still busy holding onto his pants and the carrots – where Naruto had dropped his offering. A few security pins lay in the hollow of his free hand and he closed all fingers around them protectively.

Naruto watched as Sasuke let out a small sigh that very much sounded like relief. He threw the taller boy a silly grin, waved a hand at him and with a “See ‘ya later.” returned to his friends.

His carrots completely forgotten, Naruto thought that his first contact with the usually grumpy kid didn’t go so bad.

Not bad at all.

~(˘▾˘~)

It was later that day that everything would turn Naruto’s weekend into a living nightmare, making it impossible to sleep or eat much of anything, as his tummy would be in a state of constant turmoil.

After the school bell rang everything still looked and felt like any ordinary weekend-is-here Friday. Naruto found his place on the swing set, sat astride the wooden plank and watched all the kids leave into their respective directions.

Sasuke even graced him with a glance and a teeny tiny wave on his way past the swings. Naruto had been elated.

This feeling of elation went down the drain as quickly as gravity would pull it though at the sight of what happened next.

Sasuke arrived at the black car, where the witch was already waiting by the opened back door. He stopped there, as that man put a hand on Sasuke’s shoulder, prevented him from entering and instead fell into an argument. At least that’s what Naruto guessed was happening, judging by the back and forth of words that Naruto couldn’t hear from his spot. He watched on as Sasuke’s face turned red and his annoyance seemed to grow. After another minute or two the grey haired man pointed at Sasuke’s pants. Crossing his arms before his chest, Sasuke put on a defiant face and didn’t say another word. That’s when the witch shrugged his shoulders, opened the buckle of his own belt and, in a swift move, slung it around Sasuke’s waist to fasten it there.

Tightly.

He then nudged a spluttering Uchiha – Uchiha’s don’t splutter, provided Naruto’s otherwise in alarm shrilling brain – into the car and drove off.

Naruto was half on his way to rescue, when his foot caught onto the rope of his swing, tripped him and he landed face first on the ground, shoving a hand full of grass into his protest-opened mouth. He lay there, watching what last could be seen of the car, before it rounded a corner, and felt terror gripping his little heart. Squeezing it with fear, because he knew what had just happened.

He had been a witness of attempted murder.

The belt. The tight squeezing belt. Until Snow White would breathe no more. Who would rescue him? Damn it all. Naruto wanted to scream and shout, call the police and punch in someone’s face. Preferably that of the evil witch.

But they were gone. What should he do? What could he do? He didn’t even know where Sasuke lived.

Then an idea struck him. But the dwarfs did! They knew where Sasuke lived. Did Sasuke even have seven dwarfs? Naruto knew that the story didn’t end with the belt, but it was little comfort when he knew he couldn’t make sure until Monday. When Sasuke would hopefully (oh god of ramen, pretty please) come back to school on Monday.

Until then, he had a long and miserable weekend to get through. Ample time to think of what punishment he would put the witch through, should he ever lay those evil hands on Sasuke again!

(~˘▾˘)~

Stumbling through the school entrance door, Naruto had difficulties coordinating his feet. If he didn’t hurry, he’d be late. A common occurrence, but one that was much unappreciated this gruesome Monday morning.

After his failure to save Sasuke from what Naruto knew to be the other boy’s life story, he didn’t get a wink of sleep on Friday and Saturday night. Only to finally crash in the wee hours of Sunday to Monday and thus be late for school. Going completely against his plan of arriving early for the first time ever, to check if Sasuke was still alive. Still breathing. Still there.

Bumping into at least two walls, his locker and a teacher, Naruto made it in the nick of time to his classroom. Yanking open the door, he stood there with swimming eyesight and laboured breath. With a racing heart he slowly zeroed in on Sasuke’s seat. Everything around him went on mute and faded into a void of unimportance as he stared into the ebony depths of Sasuke’s eyes. Staring back at him was a mixture of not fully concealed confusion, then uncertainty and finally smugness. Naruto himself would probably be confused if some lunatic crashed into the room only to stare at him owlishly, too.

He was here. In their classroom. Alive. Safe. An unintended but huge sigh left Naruto’s slightly parted lips.

Naruto couldn’t fathom what would make Sasuke look at him with uncertainty, but the smugness was a known evil. A status quo, basically. Naruto grit his teeth in upcoming annoyance when he realized it was directed at him.

It was their teacher’s voice that brought him back to all other sounds and sights around him, when Ms. Mitarashi asked if he’d rather be shown to his seat by Sasuke, as he seemingly couldn’t concentrate on anything more than his classmate.

Ducking his head to hide a terrible blush, Naruto hurried over to his own chair. Throwing his backpack to the ground, he felt like jelly when sinking down into his seat. All the accumulated adrenaline, since leaving for school in a rush, left him at once and he slumped forward in tired defeat.

Surprisingly the distance between his forehead and the table top was shorter than anticipated. Not softer by any means – as his head touched down on something metallic instead of wood – just shorter.

Scrunching up his eyes, lifting his head again and rubbing at the small spot that had connected too early, a silver coloured object fell from where it had stuck to his forehead and onto the table. Looking down, Naruto identified it as a security pin. Under to the security pin stood a longish box wrapped into some cloth.

For the second time in under five minutes his eyes grew to the size of saucers, when the dots connected. Sasuke had looked at him weird. His table decorated a small hand full of security pins. They were neatly placed onto a wrapped box. Security pins that he had given to Sasuke on Friday. A bento box wrapped in what Naruto now saw to be a dark blue cloth with a tiny _uchiwa_ on the side not facing the classroom. A _bento box_ , because Sasuke knew that Shikamaru and Chouji shared their food with him.

Sasuke Uchiha had secretly given him a bento box.

If his eyes watered a little bit at that moment, he tried persuading himself that the extended exposure to dry air was the cause and not a deep-felt gratitude and happiness at Sasuke’s gesture.

Ducking his head once more, this time to hide a watery but genuine smile, Naruto stole a glance from the corner of his eyes into Sasuke’s direction. Going by the red tinge of Sasuke’s ear, Naruto presumed the boy had witnessed his sudden insight to the gift.

The ear being his sole indication, as Sasuke cleverly hid the rest of his face behind his longer bangs, Naruto took it as silent agreement to not further talk about their exchange. He slid his arms around the nice looking box, pulling it closer, and lay the side of his face on top of the cloth. Facing the window, he closed his eyes and succumbed to sleep, not once losing the smile that still tugged at the corners of his lips.

~(˘▾˘~)

The rollercoaster ride of feelings – high on Friday, only to plummet the same day, stay in low spins all weekend long and finally rise to an exciting high on Monday morning again – had drained Naruto. He’d felt lethargic the rest of Monday, but bound back to his exuberant self after a good night’s rest.

The week proceeded as it usually would, except for one minor difference. Naruto wouldn’t let Sasuke out of his sight. Especially around pick up time. That’s when Naruto would, unsuspiciously, like the great ninja he was, stick close to the gates. Check out the black car that would roll around the same time every day. And of course, glare daggers at the evil witch’s head at every occasion.

He assumed the most dangerous time for Sasuke was while being trapped in the car. It was frustrating how little he could do about that. The only time he could actually do something was in the short span of school ending for the day and Sasuke getting into that death trap of a car.

How he wished to have some cool trick up his sleeve to incapacitate the witch, should he try something funny again. Like, cloning himself a thousand times and drowning the geezer under his weight. He could then grab Sasuke and they’d make their escape together. Not into the sunset, of course. That was a fairy tale thing to do. Maybe they could hide out at that wonderful smelling ramen stand he’d walked by last week.

If Sasuke noticed his strange behaviour he didn’t say anything about it. He was probably used to stalkers (AKA his fan club) by now.

Naruto had considered talking to Sasuke about his suspicions. Warning him. Making sure Sasuke would be on his toes around the witch. But their interactions had been too few, too short, barely there. He couldn´t gauge Sasuke’s reactions yet. Was afraid of them. Afraid of him thinking Naruto was different. Like so many others did.

Friday came around again and Naruto had finally relaxed a bit when nothing else suspicious happened. It was a really warm and sunny day and during home economics, their last class before the weekend, the teacher decided to seize it and do some weeding and flower planting in the official school garden. Naruto was secretly glad nobody would interfere with his ‘private’ little patch behind the gym.

He’d relaxed even further, when the familiar feelings of dirt under his fingers, sun above his head and colourful splotches from all the different kinds of flowers surrounded him. Their teacher even praised him for his enthusiasm and knowledge on gardening and that made Naruto feel pretty damn happy.

He then joined in on the fun some of the girls had started when they crept up on the boys, turned the water on full blast and pointed the spewing end of a yellow hose at their unsuspecting classmates. Nobody had been safe from the cold fountains of water Naruto had drenched their hair, clothes and finally a very angry looking teacher with. Even Sasuke looked like a drowned cat – his hair sticking wetly to his face and a small pout adorning his features.

Naruto was still snickering when, after class, his teacher kept him back to give him a lecture on inappropriate behaviour. It went in one ear and out the other, as Naruto thought about how much fun he’d had today, what to plant next to his nicely growing peonies and how nothing had happened to Sasuke this week.

Sasuke! Naruto’s heart dropped what felt like a hundred meters underground. Oh no! He’d completely forgotten about the other boy. In a panic Naruto took off at a sprint, leaving the now yelling teacher behind. As he rounded the corner of the building to get from their school’s garden in the back to the front yard and its gate, he could only watch, as the witch pulled out a comb and dragged it through a still pouting Sasuke’s wet hair. A comb! And in broad daylight even. Of course he would already be there, no doubt utilizing the exact moment Naruto’d be occupied otherwise, to try and kill Snow White again!

With a sense of foreboding Naruto kept on dashing in their direction, wanting to yell at Sasuke to dodge, but a bitter lump that tasted like self-reproaches forming in his throat, prevented him from doing so.

He was still too far away when, once again, the witch gave a little push to direct his charge to the already open back door of the car, closed it when Sasuke was tucked away in that damnable get-away vehicle and drove off after seating himself. Naruto had never met anyone this quick and sneaky before. It made saving Sasuke so much harder.

Panting heavily, Naruto came to a stop and braced his hands on his legs to support his upper body. Letting his head fall forward and the wayward strands of blond hair cover his eyes, Naruto squeezed his eyes shut to prevent drops of angry tears to fully form. He wouldn’t allow himself to cry. Sasuke wasn’t dead. He had come back this Monday after the first attempt and Naruto wanted to believe that Sasuke would come back next Monday, just as well.

Because the comb would be discovered. He was sure of that. The belt had, why should the comb not.

It’s what came after the comb that made Naruto’s breath hitch and heart run wild. Who would help Sasuke, when the witch decided he’d had enough? Who could aid with the… with a… ..a kiss.. to give back the beautiful boy his breath, after the apple would catch in his throat?

Apparently not Naruto himself. He didn’t know where Snow White lived. And a kiss? He had difficulties thinking the word, let alone saying it! How should he ever act on this life saving method? It was impossible.

With those thoughts in mind, Naruto started into his second weekend in a row that promised to bring no sleep.

(~˘▾˘)~

Monday came around and Naruto was better prepared than last week. Not that he didn’t feel tired. Or lethargic. Or all the other sleep deprived feelings. But he had forced himself to go to bed early last night and rest his body and mind as much as possible. That way he was able to rise the moment his alarm clock rang and get ready to go to school.

Naruto’s grumpiness developed on his way to school, when he hit his toe painfully on a red light post and realized he’d forgotten to bring the school uniform’s tie that every student was obliged to wear. It peaked though, when he realized, that he was the first to arrive to the classroom. The school was otherwise deprived of students and only a handful of teachers had been in the teachers’ lounge when he’d passed it.

He probably had over half an hour before the first students would arrive. Scrunching up his nose in distaste at the quiet and the eerie feeling the empty school building gave off, he stared at the other boy’s usual seat at the front.

Naruto dragged his feet over the linoleum floor until he stood in front of Sasuke’s desk and chair. He stood there for a minute or two, just looking, until he felt his eyelids drop slowly.

He hadn’t come up with a solution to the apple-problem over the weekend. It was maddening. And being as tired as he was didn’t help his higher brain functions either.

Not wanting to miss when Sasuke would arrive, he decided to just sit down in the seat behind Sasuke’s. That way, he could wake up when the other would pull out his chair or make any other kind of noise and move back to his own seat in the back row. Because he was way too tired to stay awake right now and wait with his eyes open.

Naruto woke to a feeling of fingers slightly carding through his hair and over his scalp. It was such a foreign but really nice feeling, that he gave a content sigh in the back of his throat and decided to stay put. His brain felt way too heavy to fully wake up anyways. With his sigh the fingers had stopped their caressing motions, but after a few moments of no movement from neither head nor hand the nimble fingers returned to their task. In his foggy state, Naruto decided that he really liked being caressed and let his mind go back to a blank.

Why would anybody touch his hair though? With a startled gasp, Naruto shot up from his slumped over position on his table and looked up. His eyes met a dark blue covered back and a white board just behind it. Why did the white board look so big? So close?

“Yes, Naruto? Did you want to participate, now that your beauty sleep seems over?” drawled a sarcastic voice from his left. From his left? Catching up with the situation, Naruto recognised one of his teacher’s voices. But usually it would come from further away. Blinking owlishly, Naruto turned his head and realized that he must have slept through homeroom and a good part of his first class.

The sound of snickering made him turn his head further and look into the faces of his classmates. Not the back of their heads, but their faces. Then it clicked. He’d fallen asleep in the second row to the right, because he’d wanted to catch Sasuke when the boy arrived.

Whipping around again, he now noticed that the dark blue covered back sitting in front of him did indeed belong to the classmate he’d been waiting for. When dark blue changed to almost white with a glimmer of black and red, Naruto realized that he was looking into Sasuke’s calm and questioning face. His beautiful, alive, white face. As Naruto watched on, Sasuke’s eyebrow rose further. Further?

Ah, shoot, the teacher! If he continued to turn his head around like that he might get whiplash real soon.

“No! Um... yes? What was the question again?” Naruto wished the ground would open up and swallow him whole, as he watched the displeasure on his teacher’s face amount. He could feel his face burning to the tips of his ears and, after their teacher seemed to decide to not want to deal with him this morning and turned to address the whole class again, buried said face in his hands.

What a morning. But at least Sasuke was alright. That’s all that mattered.

Gliding his hands over his face to scrape over his head, Naruto let out a subdued sigh. He shouldn’t waste his time sleeping and better think of a way to help Sasuke. When his fingers got caught in a few tangles, his mind provided him with the ghost feeling of other fingers carding through his hair.

It had been such a nice dream though.

~(˘▾˘~)

Naruto knew his life wasn’t a fairy tale. He knew he was no Prince Charming and he definitely didn’t have a horse. But how come there was Snow White, going to school with him and a few hundred other kids and there was no one person that Naruto recognised as this story’s hero? Shouldn’t there be a prince, available for kissing? Boy or girl, he didn’t care.

Maybe someone from Sasuke’s fan club would take on the difficult task. That thought made Naruto shiver. No, he couldn’t let them molest pure Snow White. They’d probably try to project their perverted fantasies onto the unsuspecting boy. Naruto would make sure they couldn’t get near Sasuke, when the witch made her next move.

The day went by in a blur. So far, Naruto had discarded everyone as unworthy of kissing Sasuke. It felt plain wrong to let just anybody try and dislodge the apple. He felt kind of unsettled, when he thought of someone else kissing the other boy’s rosy lips. Something about that thought felt even more unsettling, but he didn’t have time to think about it. He had to find Prince Charming.

Soon the school bell rang to announce the end of their last class. Had that sound been a sweet one not even a week prior, Naruto now felt like shoving it back into the bell and burry the darn thing underneath the school building.

He hurriedly bunched together his few belongings to follow Sasuke on dragging feet. Boy, was he tired. He’d make sure Sasuke would get in the car without incident and then walk to the orphanage to crash until tomorrow. Skipping dinner tonight wouldn’t make a big difference after the weekend he just had.

Sasuke threw him curious glances at their lockers, the shoe racks and again when nearing the gate. Naruto stuck especially close today. No way would he let the other boy get into a situation like last Friday again alone.

The car was already waiting behind their school gate.

From this close, Naruto, for the first time, could hear the witch’s voice, when he asked Sasuke how school had been that day. It was a pleasant voice. Deep, soothing... it sounded kind of… caring?

No no no! Naruto chastised himself. Those certainly were the witch’s powers to lure in unsuspecting children and princesses, only to fatten them up and eat them later. Ah, no, that sounded kind of wrong. Why would he eat them – wouldn’t that just make him fat? Unless he could turn into a wolf. A big grey haired werewolf with ravenous appetite. But those didn’t live in big cities, did they? A dog then, maybe. The witch did seem like a dog person. Whereas Sasuke seemed more like a ca…

Something red, round and shiny brought Naruto out of his musings. He cursed his tiredness ten times over and not staying alert to his surroundings.

The very moment Naruto had taken a dive into his head, the witch had apparently whipped out a small basket with a hand full of red fruit. Now, back to reality, Naruto watched Sasuke take one of the round objects, turn it around in his hand and lead the deep red side of it to his mouth.

Naruto launched into action with a loud “NO!”

Standing only a few meters away from Sasuke, Naruto made a run for it and upon reaching the startled boy, smacked the fruit out of his hand. It fell down onto the paved way they stood on and collided with stone making a wet sound.

Naruto cringed in a desperate manner. He didn’t have a prince charming at hand! What to do?

Naruto turned to Sasuke, saw his shiny wet lips, gripped the taller boy by his arms and, without further question, planted a sloppy, but desperate, kiss on the other’s slightly opened mouth. Upon sinking back onto his feet, from where he had had to stand on his tiptoes, Sasuke’s reaction was instantaneous.

Fire seemed to catch on his white face and a terrible coughing fit forced him to bend forward, angling away from Naruto. Sasuke threw his hands up to cover his face.

Naruto felt like crying. Had that saved the boy? Had it not? Why didn’t Sasuke stop coughing?

Still clutching onto Snow White, Naruto turned a pair of fiery blue eyes onto the witch. Who looked at him with one black eye, a befuddled expression on the unmasked areas of his face.

“Why?” Naruto cried out, desperate now, as Sasuke still didn’t get any air into his lungs. “Aren’t you pretty enough? Just because Sasuke is prettier you didn’t hav’ta try to kill him!”

The befuddled look in that sole black eye turned serious, as Naruto rattled on. “I’m gonna go to the police. I’m gonna tell them how you tried to crush him with the belt! And the comb. Give me the comb so I can show them that you poisoned it!”

The maelstrom of words turned into a blubbering mess, when finally Sasuke heaved in a huge gulp of oxygen and Naruto turned back to him. Sasuke’s shirt tightly clutched between his shaking hands, Naruto asked with a hitch in his voice Sasuke? S’uke, did the apple come out? Did the kiss work? Are you… how do…”

Sasuke had straightened back up slowly and now looked down at him with an unreadable expression. His face was still beet red.

Both of them startled slightly when a new voice came through the open door at the back of the car.

“ _Otouto_ , are you all right?” Another pretty boy climbed out of the back of the car. He had long black hair that swished over his shoulder as he moved and big slanted eyes just like Sasuke.

On the backburner of his mind a thought popped up, that would later have Naruto rolling his eyes at himself: What was with this car and beautiful people getting in and out – were they produced in there?

Naruto didn’t know the new boy, had never seen him, but noticed the concerned look he threw Sasuke. How he had asked about his well-being first. Maybe he could help Naruto?

Looking the older boy into the eyes, Naruto said with all due seriousness “Can you help me get to the police? I wanna report the witch trying to kill Snow White!” while pointing a finger at his nemesis.

Naruto got three different reactions per his request, but none as he would have expected.

Sasuke slumped his head forwards onto Naruto’s shoulder with a strangled groan. It didn’t sound very healthy. Maybe there still was a part of the apple stuck in his throat?

The witch broke out into soft giggles that somehow seemed very befitting for the man. Naruto just didn’t think the situation to be funny and therefore looked at him with ire. That only triggered full blown laughter from the man and Naruto’s “Ey!” didn’t change that one bit.

The teenager, that looked so much like Sasuke, seemed to have trouble keeping his expression serious. He looked back and forth between him and Sasuke and then addressed the former. “Those are serious accusations you are putting forward. Maybe Sasuke can help clear them a bit.”

“Tomato,” came from his shoulder as requested, but that didn’t help Naruto to clear anything at all.

He decided for a simple “Huh?” and it seemed to do the job, as Sasuke lifted his head to look into Naruto’s eyes again.

“I was eating a tomato. Not an apple. Dobe.”

Tomato? No no, Naruto was fairly sure he was able to differentiate between an apple and a tomato. He looked down to the pavement again and stared at the shining red fruit. At the small bite sized hole where Sasuke had tasted it. It was of a red color. Deep red. Not apple-white, but tomato-red.

Had he mentioned that he felt like crying? Or maybe like being buried alive?

He kept his head low and felt tears pricking his eyes. Again. He felt so tired of being emotional today. On top of feeling tired of course.

Sasuke hadn’t moved away yet, but Naruto was sure the other must think he was a lunatic. That his head wasn’t right. That he was different. If Sasuke hadn’t realized just how different Naruto was, he surely would do so now. Just like everybody else.

Sniffing once, Naruto wanted to pry his still shaking hands open to finally let go of Sasuke’s shirt.

The witch hadn’t stopped laughing yet, but at least toned it down to giggling again. From a few feet away he heard the teenager address Sasuke this time.

“We are running a bit late for training, Sasuke. Why don’t you invite…” he left a pause there and Sasuke filled in “Naruto” only for the other to pick up where he had left off “Naruto for dinner and give him the opportunity for explanations.”

“Hn.”

Naruto looked up. What did ‘Hn’ mean? Was that a yes, a no? A ‘Did you see how crazy that kid is, why should we invite him’?

Sasuke’s eyes didn’t give much away, but they had a gentle hue. Naruto rather felt than saw the other boy’s hands reach for his own. Coming across Naruto’s tightly balled fists that just wouldn’t let go of his shirt, Sasuke seemingly knew how to tackle the blonde’s tension.

He encircled Naruto’s hands with his own and murmured “We’re having _nabe_ tonight. It has lots of tomatoes inside and it’s my favourite. I’m sure you will like it.”

They heard Itachi mutter “And no one has died from eating it.”

“Yet,” Kakashi apparently couldn’t hold back from adding.

Wait! Naruto was invited to go with Sasuke? He didn’t have to go home to a place that never felt like home? He could really go with Sasuke? And his big brother, he belatedly realized, as the other had called him _Otouto_. And the witch. Who probably wasn’t a witch, just a very weird man.

He felt his shoulders gradually relax and with them the muscles in his arms and hands. His fists opened slowly and were intertwined finger by finger by his princess’ slightly bigger hands. Sasuke tugged him forwards in the direction of the open backdoor of the car.

For once he’d be sitting inside and not stand a distance away and wonder about a boy with skin white as snow, hair black as ebony and lips that weren’t as unpleasant to kiss as Naruto had thought.

THE END

_Uchiwa_ = ‘Fan’

 _Bento box_ = ‘Lunchbox’

 _Otouto_ = The casual form to address a ‘younger brother’

 _Nabe_ = A hot pot dish


End file.
